Canadian News

Charges against an 18-year-old Ottawa man have been upgraded to first-degree murder following the stabbing death of a youth in the Centrepointe area last week. Read More

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The Canadian government used a Haitian executive's property for helicopter evacuations of its citizens as violence escalated there last month, even while refusing to remove him from a sanctions list, a Federal Court application says. Read More

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Montreal's municipal employees pension fund plans to withdraw its investments from fossil fuels and 230,000 trees are expected be planted in the east end of the city. Read More

Ottawa Fire Services firefighter Megan Hills disputed rookie non-binary firefighter Ash Weaver was ever on the receiving end of hateful or bigoted language or was targeted due to their gender identity during their time at Station 47 in Barrhaven. Read More

Travis Green has a chance for a "do-over" with the Ottawa Senators. Read More

Students at two Carleton Place schools were held and later released under a "hold and secure" on Tuesday afternoon while police resolved a nearby barricading situation. Read More

CAIRO — Hamas has formally accepted a ceasefire deal that could end the war in Gaza. Israel, however, insists that its core demands were not met in the proposal mediated by Egypt and Qatar. Read More

Despite a decrease in the number of complaints filed against Air Canada over language-related issues, the airline still gets more language complaints nationwide than any other federally regulated institution, says Commissioner of Official Languages Raymond Théberge.

Canadian Labour Congress (CLC) president Bea Bruske called on federal Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre to end his party’s obstruction of the national Pharmacare Bill.

Dubbed Bill C-64, the legislation would create a framework for a national pharmacare plan, which initially would cover insulin for those living with diabetes up to $1,500 a year and $200 a year for birth control for women and gender diverse people.

After years of effort on the part of labour, non-profit groups and the NDP, the bill was finally introduced into the House of Commons earlier this year.

READ MORE: Labour celebrates pharmacare win

The Conservatives, however, have quickly sought to kill the bill in the House this week by preventing it from passing a second reading.

Conservative MP Stephen Ellis introduced a motion calling for the bill to not pass second reading because according to Ellis: “the bill does nothing to address the health care crisis and will instead offer Canadians an inferior pharmacare plan that covers less, costs more, and builds up a massive new bureaucracy that Canadians can’t afford.”

Playing politics with people’s health

Supporters of the pharmacare bill are accusing Poilievre and the Conservatives of playing partisan politics with people’s lives.

“The rights of Canadian women are too important to get caught up in partisan politics,” said Bruske. “Women across Canada are demanding that Pierre Poilievre stop blocking free birth control.”

Bruske went on to accuse Poilievre of siding with the pharmaceutical industry over working Canadians.

“We know that pharmaceutical companies will always put profit first. But why is Pierre Poilievre siding with Big Pharma against women, workers and families,” she said. “In Canada we know over one million people struggle to be able afford the medications that they need and that’s why we need a universal single-payer pharmacare plan. Conservatives have to stop the delay tactics and their cynical attempts to block free birth control for families.”

Nearly a million people sacrifice basic necessities to pay for medicine. That’s why we need universal, single-payer Pharmacare. Starting with free birth control & diabetes medication.#CPC must stop trying to block free birth control.
MPs must pass the Pharmacare Act, now.
3/3

— Bea Bruske, CLC President (@PresidentCLC) May 6, 2024

The NDP has been pushing for years for a national, universal, single-payer pharmacare plan. It was a main priority for their party and one of the conditions of their continued support of the supply and confidence agreement they have with the ruling Liberal government.

NDP leader Jagmeet Singh also strongly rebuked the Conservative party’s effort to kill their long standing pharmacare dream.

“While Canadians scrimp and save to afford food and rent, Pierre Poilievre is clear: he doesn’t want you to have free life-saving medications. He’s telling women they shouldn’t have free birth control when they need it, and he’s telling people with diabetes, you’re on your own—while he’s been benefiting from coverage paid by the public for his whole political career,” Singh said in a statement.

On Tuesday, May 7 the pharmacare bill passed second reading in the House of Commons with all but the Conservatives supporting the motion. The bill will now be reviewed by the House of Commons standing committee on health.

The post CLC president calls out Conservatives for trying to block pharmacare bill appeared first on rabble.ca.

The Gatineau development company that spearheaded the establishment of a tent city beside the Robert Guertin Arena has proposed that a new community of tiny homes be constructed on the same site. Read More

Clad in raincoats and rain boots, four daycare-aged children were laughing as they splashed in a puddle on McGill's lower field on Monday morning. On Tuesday afternoon, that spot was used by a group of civil engineering students learning how to use transit measuring devices (also known as theodolites) for land surveying. Read More

Montreal police and the Quebec prosecutor’s office are launching a pilot project to help authorities better address domestic violence-related strangulations, which they say are among the strongest indicators a victim may eventually be killed by their abuser. Read More

TORONTO — Drake's sprawling Toronto mansion was surrounded by police on Tuesday after a security guard working outside the rapper's residence was seriously injured in an overnight shooting. Read More

ROME — Laval's Leylah Fernandez made an early exit from the Italian Open on Tuesday with a 6-4, 6-1 first-round loss to Romanian veteran Ana Bogdan. Read More

The Titanic’s maiden voyage may have been doomed in 1912, but the same can’t be said for the James Cameron blockbuster the ship’s sinking was to spawn 85 years later. Nor for the more recent jukebox musical parody of the film, the Off-Broadway hit Titanique, which offers a rather obtuse and whimsical view of the ocean tragedy with a fictional Céline Dion taking centre stage. Read More

City processes for collecting and spending billions of dollars of development charges must be updated and improved to reflect the reality of new development or redevelopment within existing areas of the city — or "intensification," as it's colloquially known. Read More

Students at the University of Manitoba have started a pro-Palestinian protest encampment on a grassy open area on the campus in south Winnipeg.